Michael Carrick could become only the third Manchester United manager to win his first four competitive matches when United travel to Tottenham Hotspur on Saturday. At the end of 2018, Ole Gunnar Solskj\u00e6r began his caretaker stint by matching Sir Matt Busby in achieving that feat, and Carrick now has the chance to add his name to that short list.<\/p>\n
United reunited with Carrick last month and appointed him to lead the side until the end of the season while a full search for a permanent manager is conducted. Everyone involved agreed to those terms. There will doubtless be unspoken feelings on both sides that the next five months could serve as an audition. Carrick\u2019s prior experience in Championship management would, on paper, usually fall short of the background expected of a permanent United head coach.<\/p>\n
When the measure is simply winning games, Carrick has strengthened his case. His first three competitive results read: Man City (H) 2\u20130, Arsenal (A) 2\u20133, Fulham (H) 3\u20132. Victories over Manchester City and Arsenal were statement showings, and United made it three on the bounce with a complicated win at home to Fulham, leaving Carrick 90 minutes away from a fourth straight success.<\/p>\n
Streaks of results do not tell the whole story. United remain more concerned with performance levels and a manager\u2019s ability to get the best from his players, but a hot start undeniably improves Carrick\u2019s standing.<\/p>\n
The current run inevitably recalls Solskj\u00e6r\u2019s 2018 spell as caretaker. Solskj\u00e6r not only won his first four games but tied Busby at five and extended the sequence to eight successive wins across all competitions: Cardiff (A) 1\u20135, Huddersfield (H) 3\u20131, Bournemouth (H) 4\u20131, Newcastle (A) 0\u20132, Reading (H) 2\u20130, Tottenham (A) 0\u20131, Brighton (H) 2\u20131, Arsenal (A) 1\u20133. That sequence was halted by a 2\u20132 draw with Burnley before two further wins against Leicester City and Fulham.<\/p>\n
Solskj\u00e6r\u2019s crowning moment was the comeback victory over Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League round of 16, a result that weighed heavily in the decision to appoint him permanently. Carrick will be searching for a comparable defining occasion, but with United already dumped out of all other competitions, such opportunities are scarce and his biggest wins so far arrived at a point when a permanent decision was never going to be made.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Carrick can join Busby and Solskj\u00e6r if he wins his first four; United weigh performance, not streaks<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":6567,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[179,172],"tags":[1087],"class_list":["post-6568","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-manchester-united","category-epl","tag-coaching-change"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6568","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6568"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6568\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/6567"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6568"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6568"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6568"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}